Chapter 283: Chapter 207: Even the Mightiest Man Can’t Resist the Temptation of a Straight, Resilient, and Perfectly Elastic Stick
"Why isn’t he here? His phone is unreachable too." Yao Yao was frantic. She really wanted to share her progress with Li Xiang; she couldn’t stand the thought of him looking down on her, thinking her aptitude was inferior to Lei Xiaohui’s and Zhao Xueqing’s.
Zhao Xueqing found it a little amusing and comforted her, "Don’t be so anxious. He must have gone out for something."
Lei Xiaohui nodded in agreement. "He’s no ordinary person. He probably snuck out in the middle of the night to handle some important business. Just be patient."
Yao Yao muttered, "Is he out playing the hero again? He’s really something else. Any other man would be out Stealing Fragrance and seducing women at night, but not him. He’s always off doing something else."
’This is agonizing. Come back soon, Li Xiang. I need to tell you everything.’
With no other choice, Yao Yao could only suppress her excitement for the time being and return to her room with Zhao Xueqing and Lei Xiaohui. They spent the morning in Cultivation, then went out together for some fun in the afternoon.
After all, Cultivating day in and day out gets boring; a balance between work and rest is necessary. Moderating one’s pace is the key to endurance.
They visited landmarks like Merlion Park and Marina Bay Gardens, ate a ton of delicious food, and didn’t forget to bring back some takeout for Li Xiang, along with some local souvenirs.
These included things like crocodile-skin wallets and purses, white coffee, dried durian, Tiger Balm, Golden Lion Oil, kaya jam, Merlion memorabilia, bak kwa, and Singaporean chocolate. Laden with bags big and small, the three of them returned to the hotel.
They knew Li Xiang probably wouldn’t have time to buy any himself.
Meanwhile, Li Xiang was deep in a tropical rainforest, exploring.
Indonesia has a typical tropical rainforest climate, with high temperatures and heavy rain year-round. There is no spring, summer, autumn, or winter here—only two seasons: the rainy season and the dry season.
Typically, the dry season runs from April to October, while the rainy season lasts from November to March. It was currently August, so it was the dry season. In reality, however, it still rained frequently during the dry season, just slightly less than usual.
Kalimantan Island, also known as Borneo, is the world’s third-largest island. It is home to the second-largest tropical rainforest in the world, surpassed only by the Amazon. The climate is hot and humid, with lush vegetation and a vast array of wildlife.
There were wild boars, Malayan sun bears, orangutans, various species of monkeys, and all kinds of strange and exotic birds.
In the past, the island was also home to tigers, a fact confirmed by unearthed fossils. Now, however, they are virtually nonexistent. The island’s ecosystem can no longer sustain a breeding population of tigers.
Tigers are capable swimmers. There are records of tigers swimming 29 kilometers in a single day in a river, and their maximum recorded distance in the open sea is 12 kilometers. However, Kalimantan Island is surrounded by ocean, and the straits separating it from neighboring landmasses are far wider than a tiger’s swimming range.
This isolation prevented them from finding mates. The island’s scarce tiger population was forced into inbreeding, which ultimately led to its demise.
The reason tigers existed there in the first place is that in ancient times, the climate was much colder than it is today. Sea levels were lower, and large parts of what is now the continental shelf were exposed land.
Back then, the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra Island, Java Island, Borneo, and the Philippine Islands formed a massive, crescent-shaped peninsula. Tigers used these land bridges to spread across the region. Later, when sea levels rose and submerged the continental shelf once more, tigers were stranded on what had become isolated islands. The populations on the Malay Peninsula and the surrounding islands have been separated ever since.
Li Xiang strolled leisurely about the island. He had even shed his Black Mountain Profound Armor, opting for a simple T-shirt and shorts. He dispatched countless wild animals along the way, harvesting over a hundred "Spicy Strips" of various types—enough to feed his little kittens for several years.
With such a wide variety, the taste and texture would naturally differ, so the little kittens wouldn’t get bored.
One particularly special creature was a wingless, flying snake called the Celestial Golden Flower Snake. It was about a meter long and loved to weave through the treetops.
Before taking "flight," the snake would anchor the rear half of its body to a branch, raise its front half into an S-shape, and then launch itself into a glide. It could travel up to 100 meters and even change direction mid-air. One had to admit, it had a masterful grasp of aerodynamics.
The snakes tried to ambush Li Xiang several times, but how could they possibly succeed? In his eyes, they were moving in slow motion. He could casually reach out, grab one by the head, and toss it into his system’s inventory.
System: "Tier Six Mutated Creature detected: Agate Demon Vine."
"A vine can become a monster?" Li Xiang stared in surprise at the towering, dense thicket of vines before him.
There were many types of vines on the island, but this was the first time he had ever seen one with Extraordinary potential.
He carefully observed the cluster of vines. Seven or eight stalks grew together like bamboo, all of them remarkably thick and solid. The thickest ones were about six centimeters in diameter, and their length was staggering—several surpassed one hundred meters, with some approaching two hundred.
’These aren’t vines, they’re practically trees!’
Li Xiang was right. Vines in Indonesia were different from those found elsewhere. In other places, vines are herbaceous, but here, they are woody plants.
This type of Agate Vine was known for its thick, uniform, and solid canes, which had an even color and a firm texture. It was incredibly tough, hailed as the "King of Rattans," and was the most expensive of all high-grade rattan materials.
It was not only beautiful on the surface but also highly waterproof. Its dense structure was extremely flexible, making it resistant to splitting and highly durable.
Li Xiang took out his Chopping Knife and hacked off a two-meter-long section. He found it to be incredibly tough, perfectly straight, and smooth to the touch—a perfect natural staff.
He held one end of the staff, pressed the other against the ground, and bent it to test its flexibility. It curved into a U-shape, but the moment he let go, it instantly snapped back to its original form.
Perfectly elastic.
’Worthy of its title as the King of Rattans. This kind of Vine Stick is perfect for Martial Arts.’ A white wax wood staff, for example, was decent, but it would break or warp after prolonged use or excessive bending. This Vine Stick, however, would not.
As for the rattan found domestically in China, even in the tropical rainforests of Yunnan Province, the growing conditions meant the wood couldn’t match the hardness, toughness, and elasticity of the rattan here.
So, Li Xiang uprooted the entire plant with Extraordinary potential, stripped off its leaves and branches, and chopped the main canes into two-meter-long sections. He discarded any that were even slightly curved, keeping only the naturally straight ones. In the end, he had harvested fifty to sixty high-quality Vine Sticks, with diameters ranging from three to six centimeters.
He planned to bring them back and give a few to the girls to practice with. He figured Lei Jiaming and the others would love them too.
Since Zhao Xueqing, Yao Yao, and Lei Xiaohui weren’t as strong, this kind of Vine Stick would be perfect for them.
Li Xiang didn’t have enough Extraordinary Weapons to go around anyway. Fortunately, in these relatively peaceful times, practicing with a Vine Stick was sufficient.
On another note, Li Xiang’s strength had just increased to fifty thousand kilograms, and he still hadn’t fully "adapted" to it. It was normal to feel a bit "uncoordinated" after such a sudden, massive power boost.
His Profound Iron Mountain-Removal Rod, which weighed eight or nine hundred kilograms, now felt as light as a feather in his grip.
He decided the rattan was excellent for training, so he picked out a three-centimeter-thick staff to use as his personal weapon. By using such a light and slender tool, he hoped to hone his Martial Arts and achieve precise control over his power.
Unleashing immense force was easy; he could casually strike with tens of thousands of kilograms of power. Applying a light touch, however, was considerably more difficult.
Li Xiang patrolled the island. His top speed was 5 Mach, equivalent to 1,700 meters per second or 102 kilometers per minute. He could maintain a sprint for eight minutes, meaning a single burst at maximum power could cover 816 kilometers.
At a cruising speed of 2.5 Mach, he could cover 3,060 kilometers an hour. As long as he kept his heart rate in check, he could run for six or seven hours straight (up to a maximum of eight), easily covering 20,000 kilometers in a day.
The circumference of the Earth is only about 40,000 kilometers. If he put in a little overtime, circling the globe in a single day wouldn’t be an issue.
Kalimantan Island spanned just over a thousand kilometers from north to south and east to west. By nightfall, he had already swept across the entire island several times, causing a sharp decline in its wildlife population.
While he was on the beach, he saw some small green sea turtles crawling ashore. He picked a few up to examine them more closely and realized they were all coming onto the sand to lay their eggs.
The turtles looked adorably clumsy and didn’t seem very tasty, so Li Xiang decided not to bother them.
Some of them had barnacles attached to their shells, so Li Xiang thoughtfully scraped them off, much to the little turtles’ relief.
After a full day of training with the Agate Vine Sticks, switching between seven or eight different staffs of varying thickness, Li Xiang’s comprehension of Soft Strength had deepened.
He possessed the Giant Power of fifty thousand kilograms, yet he could now effortlessly apply an incredibly faint force, controlling it with the precision of a thousandth of a gram.
From the might of fifty thousand kilograms down to the faintest touch, his power was now completely under his command. Li Xiang had finally mastered the balance of light and heavy.
As night fell, he got his bearings, donned his Black Mountain Profound Armor, and set off to the west. Singapore was just over a thousand kilometers away. Cruising comfortably at 2.5 Mach, he arrived back at his hotel room in about twenty minutes.
He turned on his phone to find a flood of messages. Most were from the three girls, but there were also notifications from Luo Feifei, Top Aunt, the county and town governments, and work report emails from his Little Aunt at the Jade Processing Factory.
There were weekly report emails from the managers of his several directly-owned jadeite shops.
Greetings from Xu Xuan, He Zhixiang, and others.
A work report from Lei Jiaming about matters at home.
Emails from the construction company regarding project progress and the phase-three Shelter. And more.
Li Xiang sent a message to the girls’ group chat: "I’m back. Are you asleep?"
"Nope, we were waiting for you."
"We’re coming over right now."
"Li Xiang, we’re here! Open the door!"
Li Xiang got up to open the door, and the three young women filed in one after another.
The hallway, however, was under surveillance. At that moment, the young woman at the front desk perked up. She couldn’t resist tugging on her colleague’s sleeve, motioning for her to look at the monitor.
"Oh my god," the colleague exclaimed in a sweet, affected Singaporean accent. "Three gorgeous women just went into one guy’s room?"
"They must be there for... you know. Should we call the police?"
"That room belongs to the man they’re traveling with. Maybe they’re all dating. Better not to meddle in other people’s business."
"Haha, I’m so jealous of that guy. A one-on-three."
"These tourists from China are really wild."
"So open-minded. And there are four of them traveling together."
In reality, however, Li Xiang and the three women were about to discuss serious business.
